1. Accessing Page Booster:
- In NicheIQ, scroll down to the Page Booster tab.
- Ensure that you have authorized Google Search Console (GSC) to utilize Page Booster and other NicheIQ products.
2. Page Booster Overview Tab:
- Page Booster provides an overview of your page trends from the last month.
- The overview includes the top three pages with search traffic trending up and the bottom three pages with search traffic trending down.
- A bar graph in this section shows the number of pages trending up, down, and remaining stable.
- Pages with large variations in traffic over the past months are categorized as "Indeterminate."
3. Detecting Page Traffic Trends:
- Click on the "Page List" tab to see detailed information on page trends.
- Pages are organized into categories: Down, Stable, Up, or Indeterminate.
- For each tab, the list of trending URLs is displayed in a table
- Within each category, URLs are listed with the following columns: URL, Search Position, Search Position Change, Search Traffic, and Search Traffic Change.
- Click on the question mark (?) icon for expanded descriptions of each term.
- URL: the URL under scrutiny
- Search Position: Average search position over the past month
- Search Position Change: Change in average search position compared to the previous month. A negative search position change (SPC) indicates a drop which reflects the loss of relevancy of the page overall. A positive SPC suggests the page is becoming more relevant (overall) to keywords that drive traffic to it.
- Search Traffic: Total amount of search traffic (search impressions) for this URL in the past 4 weeks.
- Search Traffic Change: Change in traffic between the past month and the previous month. A negative value indicates that the URL lost search traffic overall. A positive value indicates that the page gained search traffic overall (Google search traffic only)
- You can also use the search bar to filter the list of URLs based on the substring of characters.
4. Suggested Keywords:
- Click the plus sign (+) next to a URL to see suggested keywords that can help recover lost traffic. For each keyword suggested, the change in traffic and in rank are displayed.
- Icons next to each keyword allow you to:
- Search for the keyword on Google
- Copy it to your clipboard
5. Enhancing Articles Based on Suggestions:
There are two main reasons why a keyword may have a change in the amount of search traffic it drives to a page:
- The keyword saw a change in interest: If fewer people are interested in a specific topic, they will search less for it, which results in lower search impressions and ultimately fewer clicks to your page. This happens with content that is seasonal, event-related, or news-related.
- The search result moved down the list of search results because the search engine considers the result less relevant compared to other results it is choosing to show. This happens when other competing domains write articles that rank better than yours.
For each keyword we list two pieces of information to help you determine what is going on:
- Change in search traffic for this URL and keyword
- Change in search position for this URL and keyword
If the search traffic is lower AND the search position is lower by one or more positions, it is likely the page is considered less relevant and the keywords associated with the greatest loss in traffic are the ones to focus on.
If search traffic is lower BUT there is little change in search position, the change in pageviews is likely related to a change in search volume for this keyword.
There is generally a short list of keywords suggested to help improve a page. In order to regain lost traffic, you need to improve the search position (i.e. move closer to the top of search results). For this, you need to enhance the article by covering the keywords in the first 5-10 paragraphs of the text.
Suggested Approach
- Identify the keywords that caused the greatest loss in search traffic
- Check the top-ranking articles' coverage of the keyword
- Add one or two paragraphs to your article that cover the keyword
- Think of how this paragraph contributes an additional angle to your already-written article
- Think of how this keyword supports the interests of your audience
- Think of how you might write content that is original around that keyword
In some cases, your article may be less relevant because the subject covered has evolved over time and your article is stale. In this case, it may warrant a significant rewrite of the page.
What to Avoid
- Copying the content from another page, or paraphrasing what is already found in other articles.
- Do not simply add the expressions to the article (i.e. "keyword stuffing"), which will likely not impact the ranking very much, or possibly even make it worse.
Special Cases
In some cases, the recommended keyword is very close (maybe even identical) to the central theme of your article. When this happens, it points to the fact that your article is generally weak on that subject compared to other articles that compete with your article on this keyword. In this case, a complete rewrite of the article might be in order if you really mean to rank well on the keyword/topic.
6. Monitoring and Adjusting:
- After updating an article, it may take up to 3 weeks for Google to crawl, evaluate, and index the changes.
- Continuously monitor the performance and make adjustments as needed.
7. Feedback:
- Submit feedback regarding Page Booster by visiting the Resources tab and selecting the Page Booster feedback form.